Peter Loves Animals
by hailingstars
Summary: A collection of short stories revolving around Peter, his love for animals, and Tony being exasperated by it.
1. Chapter 1

AN: Hey everyone! I'm starting uploading old Febuwhump.

These I felt like could be grouped together. All separate stories, in different AUs, with Peter torturing Tony with his love for animals.

* * *

Peter was trying to torture him or maybe, he was trying to give him a heart attack. That was the only explanation Tony was willing to accept when he brushed the blinds aside and looked out the cabin window to see Peter, at the edge of their campsite where the trees got ticker, crouching down and inching his way across the dirt, with his hand stretched out, towards an actual mountain lion.

Tony dropped his coffee, shattering the mug, busted out of the cabin and had a gun pointed at that animal in under five seconds, but it's Peter's eyes that went wide, as if the gun were pointed at him, as if the real threat in this situation were Tony and not the overgrown feline.

"Mr. Stark!" said Peter. It was a whine, and it was a plea. "You can't shoot him! And stop moving so fast, you'll scare him away."

"Good," said Tony. "He doesn't belong here."

Peter scrunched up his face. "But this is his home. We're the intruders."

Tony exhaled, pointed the gun to the sky, shot up into the air and watched with relief as the cat scampered away from his kid and into the trees.

"Aww he was almost going to let me pet him. How many people can say they've pet a mountain lion?"

"Uh, none. They're all dead."

Peter grumbled a string of somethings about enhanced healing and super strength as he sat down at the picnic table and pulled out his phone. Tony ignored it. He'd never been a fan of teenage attitude, especially when it was directed at him, and since the boy's aunt died, since they got a bit more comfortable with each other, he'd been getting more than he ever signed up for. He guessed it couldn't be helped.

It was Peter's job, as Pepper liked to remind him, to be a teenager, and it was Tony's job to be a parent. Lucky for him parents had their own arsenal of torture weapons. He sat down across from Peter at the table.

"So, kid, I think it's time we had the talk."

"What?" Peter's head was still in his cellphone.

"You know, the birds and the bees and all that jazz."

His phone slipped through his hands and fell on the table, and his eyes went wider than when the gun had been pulled. "Umm that's okay, see we watched this video at school and it pretty much explained everything."

"Well you can't learn everything in a video," said Tony. "I remember one of my first times in college–"

"-oh my god Mr. Stark I will literally do anything to get you to stop talking right now."

He threw his head down on the table, next to his phone, and covered it with his hands. Tony grinned, victorious in parental embarrassment that would have even made May proud, but after that, he did stop talking. That wasn't actually a conversation he wanted to have, either.

Tony's win lasted up until it got dark, up until it was time to make a fire and he had to confiscate all fire-making supplies from Peter before he burnt the entire campsite to ashes. Then after the fire Peter retreated to his tent. He claimed that was real camping. Tony's luxury cabin was cheating, and it took every strength of Tony's being not to force him to sleep inside, where it was safe from mountain lions and… sleeping on the ground.

He did set up some high-frequency waves to keep the any unwanted guests from coming around again, though. He didn't tell Peter. He suspected he still had plans to try and befriend the mountain lion, and Tony didn't think he could survive the whining if he completely crushed that dream.

* * *

That night Tony woke up to pounding on his window. It was raining. Hard. But also, there was a Spider-Kid sticking to the side on the cabin, knocking and yelling.

"MR. STARK!"

"What the hell?"

"MY TENT COLLASPED!"

With inward groan, Tony went upstairs and to the front door, opening it and letting a completely soaked to bone Peter Parker into the foyer.

"Why," started Tony. He took a breath. He continued. "Didn't you just come inside?"

Or in other words, why did Peter have to wake him up at all? Why wouldn't he just quiet slip inside and collapse on the couch in front of the fireplace without pulling him from sweet, restful sleep? Phrasing was everything, though. He has read more than a couple of parenting books that was supposed to teach him proper communication.

"…the door was locked."

Tony looked at him, and Peter shuffled his feet awkwardly.

"Umm it wasn't?"

"Why would I lock the door when you're sleeping in a tent outside?"

Peter shrugged and Tony sighed, turned around and started to head back towards the stairs, where his bed was waiting for him. His hand was on the railing when thunder crackled loud and monstrous, and a strain of wind hit the cabin, just as loud, just as monstrous.

"Wait," said Peter. Tony turned and Peter's eyes were darting all over the place. "I thought maybe you wanted to play a game of pool?"

A strange request for the middle of the night, but then Tony remembered the pool table was in the basement.

"You're afraid of thunderstorms? And not mountain lions?"

"I'm afraid of tornados," Peter corrected.

Tony opened his mouth to tell him there were no tornados, just wind and rain and thunder and lightning, but particularly gusty winds pelted the cabin and Tony couldn't help wondering how it must sound to Peter with his advanced hearing.

"Go get dried off, I'll get some blankets, and I'll meet you in the basement."

Peter let out a breath of relief and nodded, while Tony said goodbye to every hope he had of getting a good night's sleep before they drove home in the morning.

* * *

Peter's snoring was also torturous. It reminded Tony of how tired he was as they treaded down the interstate, as he stayed awake to drive them home and Peter was possibly, from the way it looked, having the best sleep of his life. His head was pressed up against the window, his mouth hung open slightly, and Tony couldn't help it. He took his phone out and snapped a one-handed picture.

And he almost felt bad about waking him up when they pulled into a gas station off the freeway. Almost. He knew if he didn't they would be stopping exactly fifteen minutes later so Peter could go to the bathroom.

The kid perked right up, rubbed his eyes and once he was out of the car, looked around. "Oh my god, this is the biggest gas station I've ever seen."

Peter has lived with him for exactly one year, and the things he chose to get excited about always take Tony by surprise.

"Can we get snacks?"

Tony handed him one of his cards. "Go wild."

"Yes!" He took off across the parking lot.

"Hey," Tony stopped him when he got half way there. "No coffee, no energy drinks, got it?"

Peter's shoulders slumped, but he nodded and disappeared inside.

There were worse things than Peter snoring, like him being hyped up on caffeine and stuck inside a car.

Tony filled up the gas tank and watched as a medium sized, orange and white stray cat laid hopefully near one the trash cans. He resisted the urge to go fed it, and blamed Peter for that instinct entirely. Once he was done with the gas, he got back in the car, and waited. Waited for a worrying amount of time. He was about to march into the gas station and drag the boy of there when suddenly he popped out of nowhere, appearing on the other side of the car with a giant white grocery bag filled with only god knew what.

"I got you something," said Peter, as he buckled his seat. He bent over and rummaged through the bag that now sat at his feet. Eventually he pulled out a black coffee mug. It had gold letters on it, and they spelled out 'the best dad.' "For the one you broke."

Tony took it hesitantly. It was the best gift anyone had ever gotten him with his own credit card.

"-Look I know I annoy you sometimes," he said. "And I know you planned this whole weekend to distract me, May's been gone a whole year and I don't know – I don't know how I would've had survived it without you. I guess I'm just trying to say thanks, dad."

It happened so fast, like life, that Tony almost missed it. That a few hours ago he was Mr. Stark and now he was dad. The best dad, according to the mug, and this must be some kind of new torture. Tony Stark sitting a car, trying not to get choked up by a stupid, cheap gas station coffee mug. His eyes didn't know where to go, so when they trailed out the window, they landed on that cat again. It stared back at him.

"Damnit," he said. He got out of the car, stalked across the parking lot, scooped up the probably flee invested cat, brought it back into the car with him and plopped it down in Peter's lap. "There. A new friend."

"Oh my god really?!" asked Peter. "I can keep him? I love him!"

Peter's excitement over his new pet was enough to get him through the thought of telling Pepper they would now be sharing the penthouse with a cat, or at least that's what he told himself. To his shock, she didn't mind it much after making the point to Peter that the litter box was his responsibility.

Tony never used his new coffee mug. He put it up, on shelf, behind protective glass in the workshop, so it could never get broken.


	2. Chapter 2

Peter watched from the ceiling as two pit bulls snarled at each other, as people, the worst kind of people, shouted and bellowed from the sidelines of the makeshift, circular arena. The dogs were crouched low, with their heads almost touching the ground, growling, ready to attack each other for the entertainment of a sick, sick audience.

There was stomach acid in Peter's throat as he stuck up high, as he plotted his strategy, and the anger brewed inside his chest that was almost completely foreign to him. He didn't understand why anyone would want to be cruel to animals. He thought, a bit recklessly, that he should free the dogs and let them lose on the crowd.

It was just a thought, though. Not something he'd act on. Spider-Man was better than the criminals he fought.

After just a few more seconds of debate, he decided the simplest strategy was the best strategy. He sent webs at the two dogs, sticking them to the floor, so they couldn't hurt each other, so they couldn't hurt themselves, and grinned under his mask as the patrons and the dog owners snapped their heads to the ceiling.

"Hey, what's up, guys?"

He somersaulted from the ceiling and enjoyed the looks of shock and fear. At least there was that. At least, just for a few seconds, they got to be just as scared as their victims. Peter made quick work of them and had everyone webbed to the floor quickly and effortlessly. A couple of them did try to run out the door, but Peter stopped them in their tracks, too.

Peter looked around the web covered warehouse as he instructed Karen to call it in to the police station, and the nearest no-kill animal shelter. He stepped towards the dogs, and they both bared their teeth and tried to lunge at him. Poor, angry souls. Peter hoped they would find good families, ones that could teach them how to love instead of fight.

"Some hero you are," said one of the men webbed to the floor. He held a hotdog covered in tinfoil in the hand that wasn't webbed down. "You're no friend of Queens, destroying local businesses this way."

He responded by webbing the man's mouth shut and snatching his dinner away from him. He removed the tinfoil, tossed it on the floor next to the man, and threw each pit bull half of the hot dog. That, at least, got their tails wagging.

Peter stopped when he got to the exit and turned. "I hope those webs hold up until the police get here."

His webbing could hold for hours, but the patrons of the dogfighting show, and the runners, deserved a lot worse than a few minutes of panic.

The warehouse that housed the illegal dogfighting ring had long, dark and winding hallways, and Peter walked through one of those when he heard it. A high-pitch squeal, followed by a sad, pitiful whine, came from somewhere down on the floor. He took several steps backward and looked down.

Sitting there, hiding behind a trash can, sat a small pit bull puppy. He was white with giant black spots, one that completely covered the fur around his right eye, and another that engulf his left ear. The pup looked up at him, trembling in the dark, and whined again.

"Hey, shhh," he said, as he bent down. "It's okay. I won't hurt you."

Slowly he extended his arm forward, petting him, and in return the pit bull licked his hand.

Peter fell in love.

He scooped him up in his hands and held him to his chest. "You can come home with me. Where it's safe."

If he thought the pup could understand, Peter would've explained to him there was no place safer on Earth, maybe even off it, than Iron Man's penthouse.

He stroked the tiny dog's head with his thumb as he walked out of the warehouse. He looked both ways once he was outside, then pointed his wrist towards the sky. He quickly put it back down. He couldn't swing back home. Not without scaring the hell out of an already scared pup.

Having only one choice, Peter walked back to Manhattan, wearing his Spidey suit, and carrying a trembling, crying pit bull puppy. Later he'd have to cruise through Instagram under the Spider-Man hashtag and look at all the pictures. However many of them were snapped, Peter told himself it was worth it to bring his new friend home.

Or, it would have been worth it, if Peter would've been able to successfully sneak him into the penthouse. Tony waited for him just outside the elevator. His eyes looked down at the small bundle in his hands, then up at his face.

"No, absolutely not," said Tony. He turned and marched into the kitchen, not giving Peter a chance to respond and forcing him to follow. He took off his mask and moved to stand directly in front of Tony.

"But look at him."

Peter held the puppy up like Mufasa presenting the next king of the animal kingdom. He let out a bark, and Tony blinked.

"I see him. The answer is still no."

He sat at a bar stool and diverted his attention to his phone, as if the discussion was over, but Peter was nowhere near ready to give up. Especially when he almost had him. If Tony was distracting himself, he was close to caving up, but unfortunately for Peter, Pepper entered at that very moment. Two against one just wasn't fair.

She stopped walking, looked at the dog, looked at Peter, and gave him a look he figured was invented for Tony but now used on him.

"Peter. No."

"That's what I told him but for some reason the dog is still in my penthouse."

Peter walked across the kitchen and carefully placed the puppy down on the counter, near where Tony was working so hard to ignore them both. He waited until Tony looked up from his phone to bring out the eyes.

"Dad, please," he said. He hoped he was as compelling as the puppy had been when he licked Peter's hand. He was once, but he wasn't sure if he aged out of it.

"That doesn't work on me anymore."

"Peter," said Pepper, again, and Peter's shoulders dropped.

Tony would say no over and over again, but Pepper would explain. She would give him reasons for their answer, and Peter didn't want to be reasoned with. He was in love. There was no logic in that, and he didn't feel like it was appropriate to reason with it.

"He would be very unhappy here," she told him. "A puppy needs constant attention and training, and you're busy with school and decathlon and Spider-Man. He needs a home who can give him all the attention he needs."

"That's what Uncle Rhodey said to dad when he got me," said Peter, with a frown.

Tony raised an eyebrow. "You're comparing yourself to a dog?"

Peter pouted and Tony laughed and Pepper held onto her logic, so Peter knew he would enviably have to say goodbye to the love of his life. Thanks to Pepper and her reasonableness, her willingness to explain, he couldn't even be properly angry with them.

"He can stay the night," said Tony. He dropped his phone on the table. "In the morning I'll drive you to a shelter and we can drive him off."

Peter sighed but accept it. There wasn't any point in continuing arguing with his parents when they were together. As a united front, they were unstoppable. He scooped his friend off the counter and took him back to his bedroom. At least they had the night.

* * *

Peter woke up in the middle of the night to the puppy's whining. He sat up, saw the dog was nowhere to be found and swung his feet onto the floor. He stumbled down the hallway, still half-asleep, but awake enough to realize the puppy's cries had stopped. Looking into the living room, he saw why.

Tony sat on the couch, cradling the puppy, who he'd wrapped in a small blanket. He stroked the top of his head and said, "Shh, it's okay."

It reminded Peter of his first few weeks with Tony, when all he did was cry for his dead relatives, and tony held him, let him fall asleep on him. He grinned and got a sudden boost of energy he used to jump over the back of the couch and plop down next to Tony.

"Jesus Christ," said Tony, startled. The puppy let out another whine. "Great, he was almost asleep."

"You love him," said Peter, in triumph.

"I do not. No one can sleep in this house with him whining," said Tony. Peter sunk into the couch and leaned against Tony. "You owe me, kid."

Peter straightened out and turned to look at him. "Why?"

"I talked Pepper into letting you keep the dog," he said. "Uh, I'm going to put a little dog bed down in the workshop so I can take care of him while you're at school."

"Really?"

"Yes. Just don't make me regret, okay? He's your responsibility when your home," said Tony. He passed the puppy off to him. "Which cues my exit. Keep him quiet. I need my beauty sleep."

Peter nodded and smiled at the dog, his dog, asleep in his arms, and thanked his lucky stars Tony was softer than he pretended to be.


	3. Chapter 3

Tony woke up to screaming.

His eyes snapped open, and his next response was automatic. He swung his legs over the bed, put his feet of the floor, and shuffled away from rest and towards some unknown that was certainly the opposite. Waking up in the middle of the night to strange sounds was a common occurrence whenever Peter was staying the night.

Sometimes he had nightmares. Sometimes he was simply yelling at his homework, or into the speaker of his headset at somebody miles away who'd just blown him up in some ridiculous video game. Tony knew the chances of something actually being wrong were slim, but he felt the need to check on him each time anyway. He could be sick, or scared, or dying.

He wasn't any of the three when Tony walked into his bedroom. He wasn't even there.

"Peter?" asked Tony, with a frown.

His head popped out from under the bed. Of course. Why wouldn't he be screaming under his bed at four in the morning?

"Oh hey, Mr. Stark," he said.

"Do I even want to know what you're doing?"

"Ummm, I don't want to freak you out," said Peter, slowly, biting his lip. He'd done something. The kid emitted guilt.

Just as Tony was trying to piece together what kind of wrongdoing Peter had committed, a bat swooped down from the ceiling. Tony yelled out in shock, dropped to the floor, and crawled under the bed with Peter. The two of them laid on their bellies, side by side, watching the rat with wings fly around Peter's bedroom, when the boy started giggling.

"All this time and I never knew Iron Man was afraid of bats," said Peter, between laughs.

"I am not afraid of it," said Tony. "Those things are disease carriers. Do you want rabies?"

That stopped Peter's laughing, and he went solemn.

They both watched helplessly as the bat flew out of Peter's bedroom and into the rest of the penthouse. At least Pepper wasn't home to witness this.

"I'm gonna kill that bat." Tony began his army crawl out from under the bed, but before he could stand up, Peter had grabbed his leg.

"What? Mr. Stark, no!"

He tried to shake him off. "Pete, let go of me."

"I can't let you kill Buttons!"

Tony buried his face in the carpet. Only Peter would name a bat Buttons, then advocate for its right to live. He tried, and failed, to shake Peter kid off his leg, before sighing and giving up.

"If we just trap and release, it will come back in the way it came," said Tony.

"I don't think we have to worry about that, Mr. Stark."

A horrifying reality dawned on Tony, and he turned to look at Peter. He was holding his leg with both hands still, wearing a face full of determination and stubbornness.

"Did you let that thing into my penthouse?"

His face flash with guilt. "Well…"

"Well?"

"The thing is, I thought she was sick, so I was going to nurse her back to health, but it turned out she was just… umm sleeping? Then she flew right at me! So I ducked under the bed…"

"I swear to god Peter as soon as we catch this bat you're grounded."

"…so, we're not killing it?"

"No."

Peter let go of his leg, and Tony tumbled forward without his anchor. He stood and extended a helping hand to the future zoo-keeper, pulling Peter out from under the bed and to his feet. His eyes darted around restlessly, as if the bat would suddenly materialize out of nowhere and attack them. Tony couldn't bring himself to have any sympathy for his fear. He hadn't been so afraid of it hours earlier, when he brought that diseased, winged rodent into their home.

It took Tony less than thirty minutes down in the workshop to build a cage that would attract and trap the bat. It wouldn't have taken him that long, without Peter sitting up on his desk, swinging his feet and talking his ear off about anything and everything. Tony didn't mind it. Hearing his excited chattering was worth the extra time, even he couldn't understand how Peter had so much energy this early in the morning.

Tony looked up from the cage, declared it finished, just as Peter adjusted the pot he wore on his head by the handle. Somehow, when they had been making a break for it to the elevator, to get to the workshop, Peter had had enough time to dive into the kitchen and grab what he called protective head gear, in case the bat decided to swoop.

"You look ridiculous," Tony told him, and adorable. He was waiting for Peter to get distracted so he could snap a picture.

Peter just shrugged, and grinned.

"Ready to set Buttons free?" asked Tony. Then cringed when he realized he called it by Peter's name.

"Yeah," said Peter. He jumped down from Tony's desk, and followed him towards the elevator.

As soon as the elevator doors opened to the penthouse's living room, Tony flipped a switch on the side of the cage to emit the soundwaves, and just like that, just seconds later, their rodent problem zipped straight down from the ceiling inside the cage. The lid snapped shut automatically.

"Whoa," said Peter. "That was easy."

Tony glared at him. Easy for him to say. He hadn't been awoken from a peaceful slumber in the dead of night. He stalked across the penthouse, with Peter following close behind, and stepped out onto the balcony. He flipped another switch, the door came open, and the bat took off in the New York skyline.

"Bye Buttons!"

Tony narrowed his eyes at him again, then shoved the cage at him. He stopped on his way back in, thought better of leaving that sort of technology with Peter, and snatched it back. That could've been a disaster. The next night he'd probably wake up to ten bats in his home. Technology like that, with a boy like Peter around, was better off destroyed.

Once they both made it back inside, Peter yawned, and stretched. "Well I better go to bed. I'm supposed to meet Ned earlier tomorrow- "

"Uh, no," said Tony. "You're grounded."

"But- "

"You bring a diseased rodent into my home and interrupt my sleep, you deal with the consequences." Tony began his walk to his bedroom, when his bed was calling out to him, and just like he knew he would, Peter followed with his whines.

"But Mr. Stark – "

"-I don't wanna hear it."

"I was just going to say," said Peter. "I had fun tonight. You know, running from bats and building something to catch her. We should spend time together like this more often."

"Uh huh, nice try," said Tony, and Peter deflated. That was his opportunity. He took his phone out and snapped a picture, capturing him wearing a kitchen pot on his head, backwards, like a regular person would wear a baseball cap.

"Hey!"

He slipped his phone back into the pocket of his pajama pants with a grin. "Goodnight, Pete."

He crossed the threshold into his bedroom, but then turned back to look at his kid. He still stood there, pot on his head, pouting in the middle of the hall. He felt sorry for him. Not sorry enough to lift the revenge-grounding for him interrupting his sleep, that was parental privilege, but he at least had enough sympathy to offer an olive branch.

"I had fun tonight, too," he said. Peter's face lit back up. "Next time have your animal crisis between the hours of eight and five, okay?"

With that, Tony retreated back under his covers, told FRIDAY to shut off the lights, and planned a few projects for him and Peter to tackle the next day in the workshop as he drifted off to sleep.


End file.
